The man accused of murdering a 19-year-old woman outside a Brooklyn deli after she rejected his advances surrendered to police on Friday.
Veo Kelly, 20, turned himself in to police, where he was charged with murder, assault, and weapons possession for allegedly fatally stabbing Samyia Spain and wounding her twin sister, Sanyia, earlier this week.
A video circulating on the social media platform X shows Kelly being led out of a station in handcuffs into a car. People can be heard jeering and hurling profanities at the 20-year-old suspect.
“You f—ing clown, ” one man could be heard on the video yelling directly at Kelly. “He’s a clown,” the man adds before using stronger language.
Both twins went to a bodega with their brother just after 2 a.m. on Sunday to get a snack when they encountered Kelly after he left a local club.
Sanyia told the New York Daily News that Kelly asked Samyia for her number. She gave him her Instagram instead, but he became upset when she didn’t follow him back.
“I grabbed her phone, and I was like, ‘Come with me, come with me,’” Sanyia said. “I was like, ‘Why are you talking to that boy?’ She said, ‘I don’t want to talk to that boy.’”
“He was very aggressive to one of the girls, trying to get her contact information,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny told reporters this week. “When they didn’t take to his advances, it got verbal and it got physical.”
Initially, both women and their brother were able to chase Kelly away, but he returned to the bodega armed with a knife and waited outside for them.
When the group left the store, police say Kelly stabbed Samyia in the neck and chest and stabbed her sister in the arm.
Both sisters were rushed to the hospital, where Samyia died. Sanyia recovered from her injuries and was later released.
Investigators identified Kelly as a suspect a few days after the stabbing. Police say they found the clothes he wore during the incident at his Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment, but they still haven’t found the knife Kelly used.
His mother reportedly left town right after a warrant for his arrest was executed.
The New York Daily News reported that police were not the only people searching for Kelly. Three men went door-to-door in his apartment building trying to track him down, neighbors said. It’s unclear whether the men were looking for Kelly because of the stabbing or an unrelated incident.
Police said Kelly had never met Samyia or her sister before the fatal encounter at the bodega.
A GoFundMe fundraiser was set up by the twins’ sister, Danasha Goodson, who wrote that the family wanted to organize a “beautiful memorial” for Samyia.
“Samyia Spain was bright-eyed and ready for the world. She was loving, caring and kind. The life of the party, a star in the making, a leader. She had so much more to do in this world, so much more to offer,” Goodson wrote on the fundraising page. “Samyia lost her life to senseless violence, to the fragile male ego, because violence against women has been normalized and condoned. Samyia deserves to be here, she deserves to be celebrated.”
Donations were poured in starting Wednesday, and nearly $20,000 has been raised as of Saturday morning.
